Shin Shishi Hōkōdan
The secret to perfecting the technique lay in the use of the chi and the strength of the user's emotions. As chi generated by depression and anger is 'heavy,' by projecting it into the air, Ryoga creates a massive sphere of chi that has been shown capable of instantly creating an even larger smoking crater,[59] in what appeared to be a stone foundation,[60] and later crack the earth around it, reaching the onlookers at what had been considered a safe viewing distance away from the epicentre.[60][61] The more ki generated and used in this attack, the larger the resultant sphere of destruction; the greatest visual effect was shown when used to utterly vanquish Lime (arguably the physically strongest character in the series, with the possible exception of the Orochi) in a single blow.[62] Simply being grazed by the outermost boundary of one of its most powerful strikes was enough to immediately conquer Ranma, despite the latter's attempt to lessen the impact with his weakened Moko Takabisha.[63] But a full hit from a later (apparently much weaker, given the lack of increased crater size) attempt simply stunned the latter for roughly a minute,[64] quickly followed by a strike with even less impact.[65] Ryoga's chi-generation ability is so immense that even the Dragon-Prince Herb was instantly awakened and then awed when he witnessed the final version.[66] His power similarly amazed Cologne.[67] However, unlike Herb (or Happosai), Ryoga thus far has very limited control, has not learned to empower it through any, or all of his emotions combined, much less freely access it without using them as a focus and cannot mould or focus it into a cutting edge. Although it does seem to work with anger or frustration as well. Nevertheless, no other martial artist in the series, with the possible exception of Happosai, has ever been shown to display a nearly as large amount of sheer force from single self-generated chi-blasts, much less generate a considerable amount of them without straining his reserves. Since Ryoga is "emotionally hollow" after the attack, he is typically unaffected by the blast. However, he can be distracted out of this state and thus be hit by his own blast when it falls down from above. It is unknown if this problem would remain in case he managed to direct it forward instead, given that his regular versions don't show this limitation, whether or not this would increase its force through the initial chi-pillar,[68] or if its impact against comparatively smaller combatants likewise has been greatly reduced by the very dispersed area effect. Regardless, the displayed raw power of his full blasts has at the very least equaled Rouge's strongest attacks in her Asura form. The great weakness of either form of the Shishi Hokodan is that the self-generated power the user is able to access is directly proportional to his/her emotions. If Ryoga is unable to feel sufficiently depressed, frustrated, angered, etc, he cannot use this move at all. For example: When female Ranma approached him in disguise as a "pretty girl" to learn how the move works, and as Ryoga had just obtained an indisputable victory, he was unable to make the move work, until he grows embarrassed and upset over how he is making himself look like a fool. Another weakness is, as Ranma discovered while trying to learn the move, is that it also requires emotional focus on the user's part, if the user suddenly changes emotional focus, the projectile will reverse course and come slamming back into him/her instead. In case of the perfect version which thus far slams into him anyway, the generated chi passes right through without affecting him as long as he remains in an "emotionally hollow" state. Also of note is that the technique's color varies by source. In the manga and video games, it was supposedly colored green, while in the anime it is red, and in the second film it is blue. There is some fanon speculation/rationalisation regarding that anyone, including Ranma, could generate the amount of power Ryoga does if he/she felt that intensely, but there is nothing explicitly shown within the actual story, and the very concept of chi is closely connected to lifeforce and spiritual-emotional strength in the first place, whereas nothing whatsoever implies that the derived power itself would be anything but innate. Hence, all that is known is that the inherent power that each individual user is able to access is greater relative to him/herself depending on how strongly he/she feels at the time. What can also be said is that Herb and Happosai are apparently able to use chi-blasts without an emotional focus, but this could technically also be speculated about, given that Happosai is always intensely lecherous and has been upset every time he used the blasts, and Herb has been consistently irate or intensely indignated when using his own. In any case, limiting observations to strictly by what's shown, Ryoga has most likely generated stronger blasts than anyone else, although it is not farfetched to assume that Happosai's Godzilla/kaiju-sized tangible battle aura likely requires even greater chi-reserves to generate. For comparison, it would be much easier to make a solid case for Ryoga having greater raw talent than Ranma (due to being almost exclusively self-trained), than that his chi-generation is not a comparative advantage, but either would be loose self-serving speculation. Category:Waza